Hi Guys, I have a Sako 85 Finlight in 7mm Remington Magnum and was wanting to convert to a 7mm Shooting Times Westerner. I'm intending to change the barrel and have a gunsmith rechamber it to the STW. The magazine will hold a complete cartridge to SAMMI COAL easy enough and the gunsmith said to fill the magazine completely with rounds to make sure there's no binding in the magazine well, and there's not, however there is a little binding when the bolt feeds the dummy round from the magazine into the chamber, not that much that it'll bend the cartridge in two, however, enough that it is noticeable and may be introducing some bullet runout (I really don't know if it is or not!) Note, this is just 'play feeding' using the 7mm Rem Mag barrel as a new one hasn't been installed yet so obviously I'm unable to fully chamber the thing and completely close the bolt!
Four questions, firstly has any one ever done this particular conversion before? Secondly, can a little gunsmithing ease the binding in the area by, perhaps polishing the feed ramp to a mirror finish and will the inatallation of the new STW barrel help with feeding? Thirdly is the action strong enough to take the extra STW pressures and is there any other problems I'm liable to face coverting the Sako to the STW? Lastly, I'm thinking of a Lilja Barrel, what would be a nice contour, I was thinking of a # 4 / 26" long, however, I'm happy to lug any amount of 'heft' up a mountain if it's going to equate to accuracy!

Hey that sounds like a cool project. Interesting choice of caliber, My son and I met a fella last year deerhunting, and he was carrying a nice rifle with a stainless barrel and black synthetic stock. I asked him what it was and he replied "it's a Rem. in the 7mm STW". I asked him if I could look it over and first of all the cartridges were Gynormous!! He stood at least 6 ft 2 inches and weighed 200 at least, the reason he bought it was because he undershot a large buck a few years back, and did'nt like that. He said that this caliber shot pretty well out to 400yds or even farther if he needed it to. I was pretty impressed by the rifle and if it shot as well as he said it did, than it would be pretty cool. I then asked him how the felt recoil was and he said and I quote "Well it's not a rifle you'd want to shoot very much at a time" he also claimed his shoulder grew numb from 20 rnds at his first session shooting it, and it took a few days to get the feeling back!!! Happy shootin dude!

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